This entry is about the mindset that often forms without your even realizing it when you are dieting. Every two weeks I complete a bi-weekly that summarizes my bodyweight, measurements, photos, and reflections on my diet and workouts over the preceding two weeks. Now I am just like you no matter what you may think and so when the scale was up by 0.5 lb this time well I freaked out. LOL! That’s an understatement. A dark cloud formed over my mind and the day. I was angry. After all, I have been faithfully following my program and well clearly it failed me, right? Well sad to say I took this out on my coach to whom I have since rightly apologized. She tried to tell me that the glass wasn’t empty and that I had made progress but no! I wouldn’t hear of it. After all, the scale said I was "fat" and I FELT fat! Well, you know your brain can do some amazing things, right? Feelings aren’t always based on facts.
So segue to the evening and my rant to my BFF! After venting my BFF said little. Later that evening she emailed me the following blog post by Coach Erik Ledin of Lean Bodies Consulting (http://www.leanbodiesconsulting.com/):
This is a post I made previously that I thought deserved to be immortalized in my blog. 
It’s always worth a second look …
Why does bodyweight matter so much to ‘you’?
This is going to turn into more of a rant I think.
What does bodyweight tell you? It tells you what you WEIGH!! Who knows what you weigh? You. Who cares what you weigh? No one else.
What are your goals when it comes to training and nutrition? In most cases, at some point, it will be fat loss … or is it just weight loss? Do you care where your weight loss comes from? Or is the only thing that matters is seeing a lower number on the scale. What if you looked the same? Just a smaller version of your current self? Would that matter?
Ok, so I’ll assume and answer for you – you care about FAT loss, not weight loss.
I mean, if you didn’t care where it came from, then you’re perfectly fine with your weight loss coming from a combination of fat AND muscle right? It’s all good as long as that stupid scale comes down right?
Come on.
What does the scale tell you?
I’m waiting …
Yes, the answer is that easy.
It tells you what you WEIGH!!!
It doesn’t tell you anything about what the composition of that weight is. It says nothing about bodyfat, muscle mass, fat, or anything else. It tells you what you weigh.
Why is it such an important number to you?
Other people don’t know what you weigh; they see what you look like. What are people’s perception of what you look like based on? The composition of your bodyweight – muscle, fat, bodyfat, etc and NOT the number on the scale. People know if you’re in shape or out of shape, if you look good or don’t look good based on well, what you look like … obviously. Not based on the tshirt you have to wear every day that gives a daily update of your bodyweight.
Let’s say you dropped 5 lbs of fat. That’s good.
Let’s say, you happened to gain 5 lbs of muscle. That’s really good.
Uh oh, problem. It would appear to me that if the above were true, you’d register no change on the scale. You weigh the same.
You’re a failure.
Or are you?
That might not register as weight loss on the scale, but that represents a 10lb change in the look of your body. Is that not why you’re training? To LOOK better?
Your waist is smaller, your hips are smaller, your legs are smaller, your clothes fit better, friends and family are commenting on your ‘weight loss’ and asking you what you’re doing … and yet? Your weight hasn’t changed much.
Failure. You realize because of the stupid number your scale spits out … that you’ve made no progress.
Come on!
Is this resonating yet?
Of course you’ve made progress. Plenty of it.
If your measurements have come down, you’re smaller.
If you’re smaller, you’re losing fat.
Fat is weight.
If you’re losing fat you’re losing weight (that is associated with the lost fat)
If the scale says you’re not losing weight in light of the above, well something’s happening.
Something is being added to your body to counterbalance the loss of fat weight.
Guess what? This isn’t a bad thing.
Chances are you’re in the SWEET SPOT of simultaneous fat loss … and muscle gain, which is not easy to do, so if you’re there, be happy and enjoy it!
So the addition of muscle (weight) is counterbalancing the loss of fat (weight).
Is this not a great thing?
What improves how your body looks? Fat loss and muscle gains. NOT just weight loss for the sake of seeing a smaller number on the scale.
Now, get over the scale already, and start paying attention to the signs that your body is improving – measurements, skin fold readings (maybe), how your clothes fit, comments from others, etc.
Got it? Good.”
URL: http://leanbodiesconsulting.com/blog/category/beware-scale-rant/
The most amusing part is this morning well, the evil scale said my weight was down! LOL!
Another new friend posted this quote in her journal. I really like it and want to close with it today:
“Hope begins in the dark, the stubborn hope that if you just show up and try to do the right thing, the dawn will come. You wait and watch and work: you don’t give up.”
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